Bill C-10 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Broadcasting Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the Broadcasting Act to, among other things,
(a) add online undertakings — undertakings for the transmission or retransmission of programs over the Internet — as a distinct class of broadcasting undertakings;
(b) update the broadcasting policy for Canada set out in section 3 of that Act by, among other things, providing that the Canadian broadcasting system should serve the needs and interests of all Canadians — including Canadians from racialized communities and Canadians of diverse ethnocultural backgrounds — and should provide opportunities for Indigenous persons, programming that reflects Indigenous cultures and that is in Indigenous languages, and programming that is accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities;
(c) specify that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (the “Commission”) must regulate and supervise the Canadian broadcasting system in a manner that
(i) takes into account the different characteristics of Indigenous language broadcasting and the different conditions under which broadcasting undertakings that provide Indigenous language programming operate,
(ii) is fair and equitable as between broadcasting undertakings providing similar services,
(iii) facilitates the provision of programs that are accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities, and
(iv) takes into account the variety of broadcasting undertakings to which that Act applies and avoids imposing obligations on a class of broadcasting undertakings if doing so will not contribute in a material manner to the implementation of the broadcasting policy;
(d) amend the procedure relating to the issuance by the Governor in Council of policy directions to the Commission;
(e) replace the Commission’s power to impose conditions on a licence with a power to make orders imposing conditions on the carrying on of broadcasting undertakings;
(f) provide the Commission with the power to require that persons carrying on broadcasting undertakings make expenditures to support the Canadian broadcasting system;
(g) authorize the Commission to provide information to the Minister responsible for that Act, the Chief Statistician of Canada and the Commissioner of Competition, and set out in that Act a process by which a person who submits certain types of information to the Commission may designate the information as confidential;
(h) amend the procedure by which the Governor in Council may, under section 28 of that Act, set aside a decision of the Commission to issue, amend or renew a licence or refer such a decision back to the Commission for reconsideration and hearing;
(i) specify that a person shall not carry on a broadcasting undertaking, other than an online undertaking, unless they do so in accordance with a licence or they are exempt from the requirement to hold a licence;
(j) harmonize the punishments for offences under Part II of that Act and clarify that a due diligence defence applies to the existing offences set out in that Act; and
(k) allow for the imposition of administrative monetary penalties for violations of certain provisions of that Act or of the Accessible Canada Act.
The enactment also makes related and consequential amendments to other Acts.

Broadcasting Act

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if my colleague would agree that francophones in Quebec and across the country may not be getting their fair share of air time on the networks.

If new taxes were to be imposed on Amazon and its ilk, would my colleague agree that 40% of the royalties collected should be go towards the production of French-language content? This is one of the demands of the Bloc Québécois.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I have a very good-sized francophone community in my riding. I have spent time with them. They are very patient with me as I stumble along in my very poor French, and I want to thank them for that.

I think that it is absolutely imperative that we see a lot of francophone content in this country. This is a country that is built on two languages. This is so important. I also think it is important to see more investment happen in indigenous platforms as well. I know, for example, in my riding we have a radio station, The Raven, that is indigenous-led and is working toward having more language content on the radio station, as well. I think we need to see investments in that, just so that we remember the amazing diversity we have in our country.

[Arif Virani, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr Speaker, it is my pleasure to address the House today from my riding in Toronto on this important piece of legislation. Bill C-10 is a crucial initiative that will bring the radio, television and telecommunications sector into the 21st century.

As we have previously heard in the speeches from many of my colleagues, the last major reform of the Broadcasting Act occurred in 1991. All of us have witnessed an incredible shift in the radio, television and telecommunications sector since that time. Back then the Internet was not even in its infancy: It was the purview exclusively of the U.S. military. I did not even obtain my first email address until about 1994, if memory serves correctly, when I was in my last year at McGill. It is incredible to think that an act drafted around basic radio and television technology, circa 1991, is still regulating the sector today.

Today, as parliamentarians, we are taking an important step forward in modernizing broadcasting regulation in Canada. Nowadays, we know that this sector has remarkably flourished and represents a unique opportunity to access culture. Many platforms have emerged, including Netflix, Disney+, YouTube and Spotify. These provide opportunities to share Canadian culture and content all around the world, also while consuming cultural content here at home that comes from several different countries.

However, online broadcasting services are currently not subjected to the same regulations as traditional broadcasting services. This bill would fix that basic inequality. Canadians greatly benefit from accessing foreign productions, but it is also essential to support our Canadian producers and creators, especially now during a pandemic, when showcasing Canadian content and telling Canadian stories is so critical to the well-being of all of us. This is something that we as a government have always sought to do since coming to power in 2015, by funding our national broadcaster the CBC, and by increasing funding to the Canada Council for the Arts as well as to Telefilm Canada.

However, one issue has remained a stubborn obstacle. How do we support Canadian content in an era when the methods for broadcasting are shifting massively, from radio and TV to online? Bill C-10 would fill this void by providing the CRTC with modern regulatory tools.

Canadians are increasingly using online platforms to access cultural content. For instance, it is estimated that 62% of Canadian households currently use Netflix. This dramatic shift has resulted in an increase of approximately 90% in online video revenues per year for the past two years. Meanwhile, conventional broadcasters have experienced a steady revenue loss of 1.8% per year for the past five years. These alarming statistics clearly demonstrate that the CRTC's regulatory framework needs to be adapted immediately to better support Canadian content producers in order to level the playing field.

Implementing the changes in Bill C-10 would quickly produce clear and concrete impacts. Let me give an example. By creating a new category of broadcasting under the online broadcasting category, Bill C-10 could lead to increasing contributions to Canadian music and stories by as much as $830 million by 2023. This is excellent news for our Canadian cultural sector.

Let me speak about diversity. In addition to levelling the playing field between the traditional broadcasting services and the web giants, by ensuring that web giants contribute to the creation, production and distribution of Canadian stories and music, this bill would also reflect where Canadian society is in 2020. The new regulatory framework outlined in Bill C-10 is focused on building a more inclusive cultural sector as part of the larger goal of building a more inclusive Canada.

Supporting diversity and inclusion is essential, and that it is exactly what Bill C-10 would do. Anglophones, francophones, racialized Canadians and Canadians of diverse ethnicities, socio-economic statuses, abilities, sexual orientations, gender identities and expressions all deserve to be represented in our cultural sector. I cannot stop myself from thinking about all the kids out there, including my own brown-skinned South Asian children, who are watching shows and dreaming of their future. They have to know that their dreams can come true and they can achieve everything that they want. Seeing people who look like them in the shows that they watch is undoubtedly important. I know this as a parent. I know this as a racialized parliamentarian.

We know that representation is a key step to reaching better inclusion of marginalized groups. The logic that applied when we decided to put Viola Desmond on the $10 bill to ensure that all Canadians, including Black Canadians, could see themselves represented in our institutions, also applies here in the cultural sector. The more Canadians who can see themselves reflected in our cultural sector, be they religious or racial minorities or others, the better we are as a nation.

I want to also highlight the importance of improved support for indigenous cultures in our broadcasting sector. During the last Parliament, I was privileged to be asked by the Prime Minister to serve as the parliamentary secretary to the then minister of heritage. In that role at that time, I had the chance to work on co-developing with first nations, Inuit and Métis leaders Canada's first ever Indigenous Languages Act. The work I did on Bill C-91 in the last Parliament deeply shaped my own understanding of the need to protect indigenous cultures and languages in order to empower first nations, Inuit and Métis people on Turtle Island.

By including concrete measures in this bill to better reflect indigenous cultures in Canada, Bill C-10 will contribute to that work of the revitalization of indigenous languages by ensuring that indigenous children have access to cultural content in their languages. Let me emphasize that Bill C-10 would have a real impact on the preservation and revitalization of indigenous languages and cultures, which is fundamental to reconciliation.

I am also pleased to see that the broadcasting system will be adapted to the needs of persons with disabilities. There is a lot of work ahead of us in order to build a more inclusive Canada for people living with disabilities. Ensuring that programming on TV, radio and online is accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities is a step in the right direction.

When I speak about my riding of Parkdale—High Park, I know that promoting arts and culture is a very important issue not only for my riding, but indeed for all Canadians. I want to highlight, for example, that just last week Warren P. Sonoda was elected president of the Director's Guild of Canada. I had the opportunity to work with Warren on important roles when I was the parliamentary secretary to the minister of heritage. I am thrilled to see what he will accomplish while holding that position. I want to credit the work by outgoing former DGC president, Tim Southam.

My riding of Parkdale—High Park is known for many people like Warren and Tim. It is known for great artists, wonderful creators and important film and TV producers. I am speaking for example of Dave Forget, currently on the national executive team for the Director's Guild, having previously worked for 14 years at Telefilm. He has spent most of his life working in the film industry, and I am proud to call him a constituent.

Additionally, professor Chris Romeike in my riding did the cinematography on the recent movie The Inconvenient Indian, which was based on Thomas King's bestseller. It explores the cultural colonization of indigenous peoples in North America and was deemed by the producers of TIFF as the one must-see film at TIFF this year.

I want to congratulate so many people: Paul Barkin, Mary Young Leckie, John Turner, David Makin, Alain Zweig, Jasmin Mozaffari and Ali Kazimi, for all of their important and award-winning work and contributions to the film and TV sectors. Ferne Downey, who was mentioned in the context of the previous speech, is my constituent. She was previously the head of ACTRA and is now the head of the International Federation of Actors.

I could keep going much longer, but I will mention one last person: Jeff Churchill, of Jitterbug Boy, an original footwear company in my riding whose shoes are being made for a variety of shows such as the upcoming Batman film. What is important about that last reference is that when we support the Canadian cultural centre, we are also supporting all of the derivative economic benefits that come from supporting film, TV and our content creators. That is what Bill C-10 will enable us to do by better funding the sector and levelling that playing field. This is a critical piece of legislation.

We know that financial support for Canadian content will decline as the revenues of traditional radio and television broadcasters continue to decrease. Bill C-10 is the first step in aiming to fully modernize the broadcasting system in Canada to ensure that both traditional and online broadcasting contribute to the Canadian broadcasting system. Our Canadian producers deserve to be operating in a fair situation where the rules are equal for everyone. Allowing the CRTC more powers to modernize the regulatory framework is important, by imposing more regulations on online broadcasters, as is simultaneously ensuring the regulatory independence of the CRTC.

In conclusion, as I have outlined, Bill C-10 is about ensuring fair and equitable treatment between traditional and online broadcasters. It is about better representation of Canadian society in our cultural sector. I am incredibly proud of our Canadian cultural sector, and in particular the role it is playing in buoying Canadian spirits and easing Canadian anxieties during the COVID-19 pandemic. I know that with the right tools, our Canadian creators will continue to keep producing terrific Canadian content for years to come. Bill C-10 is one of the tools we need to maintain our support for Canadian creators. The work of passing it should not be a partisan issue, nor should it be delayed. We cannot afford to wait 30 more years before modernizing the act. The time to act is now.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Mr. Speaker, what happens if companies like Netflix cannot comply with the new regulations? An organization like Netflix would have to make a decision between cutting the service or complying with the new regulations. What does the member think Netflix should do? Take the company home and stay in the United States or actually offer Canada some decent service?

[Arif Virani, Liberal, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member's question is an important one. It deals with freedom of contract and the way economic activity operates.

At this stage, when we have Netflix with as much penetration as it has in the Canadian market and we see other nation states taking the exact same actions that we are taking, we are proceeding and leading in helping to level the playing field. We will get to the point where domestic content production is protected by various nation states. The notion of Netflix retreating from Canada and going to some other haven that does not have the same sort of content requirements will be far-fetched. That is not the future I envisage.

Is it time to be more strict and enforce rules against online giants? It is. We are doing something that other nations are doing, but we are also leading other nations where we need to get to, and that is ensuring that Canadian content, which was always supported by the radio and TV sector, is also supported by the online sector.

[Louise Charbonneau, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his excellent speech.

He clearly pointed out that Canadians and communities that are racialized or diverse, have a certain economic status or have disabilities should also be included in Bill C-10.

Why does this bill not make more reference to the linguistic minority, in this case the francophones who live all across the country, especially in Quebec, of course, but also in other parts of Canada? Does he believe that these groups should have greater prominence in this bill?

[Arif Virani, Liberal, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleague's question. I would also like to point out that I learned a great deal of French in Trois-Rivières in 1992.

The answer is yes, of course we must promote the cultural content of any sector here in Canada, such as linguistic minorities, especially francophones outside Quebec and also those living in Quebec.

I am thinking of the great filmmaker Denys Arcand, and also the first-rate Canadian content that men like Mr. Arcand have spread across Canada and around the world. That is why I pointed out that all minority groups, such as racialized people, indigenous people, people with disabilities, and also francophones outside Quebec, must have support. This bill will give them that support.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Canadian cultural sector is a key driver of sovereignty and the development of a strong multicultural Canadian identity. The film and television industry in British Columbia is incredibly important to the economy of Vancouver, B.C. and , in fact, all of Canada. CBC and Radio-Canada are treasured public voices that bind our nation in ways that commercial broadcasters do not.

How does my hon. colleague see Bill C-10 contributing to these institutions and industries? What is the main value of this bill in his view?

[Arif Virani, Liberal, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Vancouver Kingsway for that insight. The most direct application for a place like B.C. and a city like Vancouver or the Lower Mainland is the fact that it already serves as a large centre for film and TV production work in particular.

By creating a bill like Bill C-10, which has the potential of raising almost a billion dollars for a Canadian content production, we can help shift some of that production to localities like Montreal, Toronto or Vancouver, for example. They could attract that work, not just work that is a shipped over production element from Hollywood, for example, but, rather, producing good Canadian content that is Canadian stories and Canadian productions on Canadian soil. The potential of this bill is about that.

There certainly is a lot more work to be done, but I am very appreciative of the tremendous work that has always been done out of Vancouver in the film and TV sector, and we want to promote more of that through a bill like this.

[Martin Shields, Conservative, Bow River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, a tremendous number of speakers have spoken to this issue in the last two days. I could ditto what my colleague from Saskatoon had to say. He was fantastic. He knows the industry. There have been some great speeches and a lot of good questions.

Some people may remember when they had to turn the channel on the TV, but let us go back a little further. I can remember when there was one radio station we listened to. At Christmastime, we would gather around to listen to the Queen's message on Christmas day.

I remember radio shows where they started with somebody walking down a hallway, knocking on the door and saying “Who's there? It's the happy gang”. I go back a little ways on that one. We got to listen to the The Shadow. If we were good in school, the teacher turn on the World Series, because the games were not played at night. It was always a treat if a teacher would let us listen to the World Series on the radio.

Then, when we got our first TV, I wondered what all those numbers were around the dial. What was 1 and 13 and all those other numbers? We had one channel. When we turned the TV on, we saw a test pattern for half an hour in the afternoon before a program started. If people think they know about old-time TV, I do not think so.

Let us look at the 1950s in the sense of TV and what happened in September and October 1956 and January 1957. One of the highest rated shows in the U.S. in the 1950s was Elvis Presley on The Ed Sullivan Show. However, we saw censorship for the first time when, in that 1957 show, they were only allowed to broadcast him from the waist up. People did not want to be exposed to “Elvis the Pelvis”. The cry of people was that the world had all gone to hell, because Elvis was on public TV. That was censorship back then, and I think that might be some of the concerns we have today.

Where were people during the Cuban missile crisis in 1962? We were all watching the TV. When we went home from school, we did not know if we were coming back the next day. In 1963, Walter Cronkite and Knowlton Nash covered the assassination of John F. Kennedy. In 1966, we got the first colour television. I remember watching Bonanza for the first time in colour. In 1969, people were glued to their TVs to watch the landing on the moon.

We had an interesting show called This Hour Has Seven Days, with Laurier LaPierre and Patrick Watson, which ran from 1964 to 1966. Why did that show disappear? A lot of people out there would suggest that the establishment could not take the rapid fire from Watson and LaPierre, so that program was cut.

When the Vietnam War came along, I was on both sides of the border, getting my university degrees. When I read the media from both sides of the border, it was like a different war. Which one was right? Was it censorship or was it fake news, depending on which country one was in? I did research for a political science professor who, as a research assistant, later testified in Senate hearings about information that was not in the news. It was interesting.

These kinds of things have been around for a while. We now have a bill that has been moved. Supposedly, it is a whole different era when we talk about all these things. We are just beginning to learn about some of the things out there, such as Twitch and Reddit. I just learned about things like Facebook and Twitter, but now we have new ones like Twitch and Reddit. The younger generation knows them, but most of the people who are a little older or a little younger than me have no idea what they are.

One of the things from the Yale report, which is also in this bill, is talk about strengthening the cultural, political, social and economic fabric of Canada. This is interesting because we have talked about rural broadband for years. The government is talking about getting something done by 2026. It has said that we will have a 50 download/10 upload. In the agricultural sector that is not quick enough. The government talks about it as at the last community, but we need it at the last farm gate.

If we want the economic fabric of Canada strengthened, we need much better than that. We have companies like Telus that are now buying up agricultural companies, which is fantastic. However, what our agriculture sector needs in downloads/uploads is much more than 50/10 if we are to strengthen the economic fabric of our country.

We need to deal with broadband. We need to see how that can be improved or we will not strengthen it, whether it is with broadcasting or not. However, it is part of the social media that needs to be developed in rural areas.

There are other things we need to do. One of the things proposed in the Yale report, and I do not see it in the bill, which is a good thing, was that anyone who sat on the CRTC board had to live in the capital region. What a divisive recommendation, that someone has to live in the capital region to be on the CRTC board. That one did not show up, which is good. A lot of things came out of that Yale report. I hope the CRTC does not pick that one up and implement it up under the regulations. It would not be good.

The Yale report also talked about news and current events being reported in the media. It talked about regional, local, national and international. What did not show up in this bill? It includes local, regional and international news, but not national news. National news and current events have been left out of the Bill C-10, which is very interesting because the Yale report included it.

In recent times, many of my constituents have said that Global TV, CTV and CBC might as well be U.S. channels because they carry more U.S. news than Canadian news. With the appointment of the Supreme Court justice in the United States, we would have thought we were in the United States, given the amount of coverage it received. My constituents have asked me why our national broadcasters do not cover more Canadian news and why they are infatuated with the U.S. It is a good point. There is a lot of local stuff out there, but they are infatuated with what goes on below the 49th parallel apparently.

We can look at the things in the bill and ask if can be strengthened, can it get to the news stuff, will people who work in Canada be taxed. I do not know whether the bill covers this. I do know something about local content. I live in a community of about 15,000 people. Three documentaries have been done on this community in the last 15 years and a proposal for the fourth one is being developed.

The documentaries 24 Days in Brooks, Brooks: The City of 100 Hellos and From Sherbrooke to Brooks have won a number of awards at film festivals. There are great local stories and great local content out there and we need to have those stories told.

As I said, many people have addressed Google and Facebook. The problem I have with this is the federal government is spending zillions of dollars on advertising on these foreign platforms. I only have weekly newspapers in my riding and they cover the real news in my communities. They cover the municipal governments, the school boards and minor hockey. They cover all the events in the communities and they talk about what is happening.

Major newspapers are not going to cover that. Where did the federal print advertising go for local weekly newspapers? It went to the international big guys. The local papers that actually produce the real stories on what goes on in communities has lost that advertising. That advertising has gone out of the country; Canadian taxpayer money has gone out of the country. That is not right. We need that print advertising to support our local papers, which produce the real stories in our communities.

I do not think amendments will fix this bill, but we can try in committee. I have been in a lot of committees where we have attempted amendments. The government, which writes the legislation, is not very friendly to amendments unless it is for itself. Therefore, it will be a challenge to amend this legislation. There are some big challenges with it. It will go to committee, but I do not think it will get fixed.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Economic Development and Official Languages (Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency)]

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the member about indigenous broadcasting, but first I want to thank him for his trip down memory lane. It was very fun.

I want to correct a couple inaccuracies about broadband and the great work that the broadband minister has been doing in connecting, already, over a million people. The member mentioned 2026 being the start of the action, but actually it is close to the end. By then, 98% of Canadians will be connected.

I want to give a big shout-out to Canadian indigenous broadcasters. Northern Native Broadcasting in the Yukon does a tremendous job. I hope it gets increased funding through the local content ramifications of the bill. I know the member is a big supporter of indigenous people and I am sure he is in support of the local indigenous production of their own stories that this bill would help.

[Martin Shields, Conservative, Bow River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome the comments from my colleague. I am glad to hear that some of us still remember some of those things down memory lane.

Yes, there are tremendous indigenous stories in my riding. I have an indigenous constituent who has been able to acquire two white buffalo. Those are the rarest buffalo in North America. The story of how he acquired those and what he is doing with the two white buffalo is fantastic. I spent about three hours at his place listening to the stories of the white buffalo and their significance.

On broadband, I have people who have very large farming operations. It is not going to work at 50/10. It is just not enough and will not work.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad the member drifted off topic there a bit and mentioned some of the rural newspapers, which are the lifeblood of my riding as well. I think I have 14 weekly newspapers, and I want to give a shout-out to The Valley Voice, a biweekly newspaper based in New Denver in the Slocan valley. They have talked to me many times about the lack of government support for their efforts, which are really widely read. They are an essential part of getting the news out in the rural parts of my riding.

Can the member expand on what other supports he could see the government giving those sorts of newspapers, either online or in print?

[Martin Shields, Conservative, Bow River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is really good to hear other people talk about their weekly and rural newspapers. They are incredible sources of information. They have real facts. There is no fake news in them. There is no sense of dispute on what they are talking about because they are printing those for the people in the local communities who would know better if they did something that was not accurate. They do a great job of covering the real events. During COVID, that is where people got a lot of real information about what was happening in their community. The major dailies are not going to cover what is going on in those small communities, but the rural ones do. It is phenomenal.

They are looking for advertising dollars. They do not want a handout. They want the advertising dollars that have gone to the international companies and media platforms. That is our taxpayer money going somewhere else.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to join my colleague from South Okanagan—West Kootenay and point out that there are lots of newspapers in my area. However, where he would only mention one, I can say the Penticton Herald, The Daily Courier, the Kelowna Capital News, the Merritt Herald, the Peachland View, and they go on. Because all politics is local, I appreciate the work they are doing every day.

To this issue, government members today continue to play this game where they say they will be investing $800 million in new Canadian content. The thing is that they seem to neglect to mention where the money is going to come from. They may pretend it is going to be the big companies who will pay for it, but at the end of the day, the big companies are not the ones who pay the subscription fees.

Could the member please electrify the House with who is actually going to be paying the bill?